Pine Siskins!

Yep, it's been a while since I've last posted.  And, yep, that means that I've been busy with work.  But I have managed to see a lot of cool stuff over the past few weeks, starting with these infrequent visitors...



Pine Siskins were seen at our feeders from this past Saturday through the MLK holiday.  And although there were only three of them (feeding with American and Lesser Goldfinches), they were around OFTEN.  And for all I know, they may have been around for a week before then and may still be around now (having to leave for work by 8 am is such a drag).  While they've been here before, it's never been for more than a morning or evening at a time.  They spend the entire three-day weekend here this time, pigging out on both sunflower chips and thistle.


American Goldfinches and Pine Siskins

Possibly even more interesting than the Siskins was the increasing frequency with which Townsend's Warblers and Ruby-crowned Kinglets have been eating sunflower chips at my feeders.  This is something that I had seen before, but it's become much more frequent over the past couple of weeks.  At first, I wasn't completely convinced that they weren't eating mites or other small insects that had collected on old seed.  So as a "control experiment," I cleaned/bleached/dried my tube feeder and refilled it with chips and black-oil sunflower from freshly-opened bags the following morning.  Within a couple of hours, two Townsend's Warblers and at least one RC Kinglet visited the feeder multiple times each.


Townsend's Warbler diggin' the chips

I was also able to finally snap a photo of a Crow snatching peanuts from my carousel feeder.  This took some time because they avoid the feeder whenever I'm standing near the window (yes, they're THAT intelligent and conscious of their surroundings).  The photo that I did get was taken from the far side of the living room and, amazingly, it turned out OK...




Outside of that, the weather has turned from mild and very rainy to very cold and dry/sunny recently.  We've had lows of 21, 21, and 25 over the past three days (and it's currently 25 as I type this).  Needless to say, I've had to store the hummingbird feeder in the bathtub overnight and I'm even firing up the tea kettle to thaw the bird bath in the mornings.  About 10 minutes after I thawed the bath this morning, a male Varied Thrush stopped by to bathe in the "hot tub."

Everything else has been pretty much normal.  All of the normal species have been around, with notable increases in Flickers, Scrub-Jays, and Lesser Goldfinches.  Brown Creepers have also been present, sometimes two at the same time.  I'm also seeing two Townsend's Warblers (a male and a female) and two Yellow-rumped Warblers that constantly chase each other away.  While I was seeing more Starlings earlier in the month, I'm only seeing one a time now and (thankfully) not very frequently.



A Ruby-crowned Kinglet snacks on suet... about three feet from my lens.

I'd love to say that I'll post again next week, but that ain't gonna happen.  I'm just waaay too busy with work right now.  But I promise that I'll be back in about two weeks.  Until then...

• Posted at Thursday, January 24, 2008 01:18 AM
• In General Category | Permalink